


The Pike Torchwood Connection

by imamaryanne



Series: The Pike Torchwood Connection [2]
Category: Baby-Sitters Club - Ann M. Martin, Torchwood
Genre: Crossover, F/M, Gen, Minor Character Death, Original Character(s)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-08-21
Updated: 2014-07-23
Packaged: 2017-12-24 05:52:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 18,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/936162
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imamaryanne/pseuds/imamaryanne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When John Pike dies, he leaves his son Nicky a cryptic note about a possible alien abduction twenty-three years earlier. The note leads Nicky to Cardiff, Wales, where he encounters the man his dad told him about, and he becomes embroiled in the organization known as Torchwood.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Grief

**Author's Note:**

> This is a sequel to my earlier work, 51st Century Pheromones. It should be read before beginning this one.

Nick Pike sat against the wall, his knees drawn to his chest. He looked around at his siblings, taking in how they were handling things. Claire was sitting on the couch, reading a letter and openly weeping. Vanessa had her head buried in her laptop, typing away furiously. The triplets were arguing quietly among themselves over whether they should go say their last goodbyes to their father as a group (as Adam and Jordan wanted), or individually (as Byron wanted). Mallory was looking forlornly out the window on the other side of the couch, her arms crossed in front of her chest. 

Margo was not in the room. She was in the bedroom right now, getting her chance to say goodbye. Whether John Pike had the strength to make it through eight individual goodbyes remained to be seen. The decision had been made that, since Claire had only gotten twenty-eight years of life on Earth with her father still alive, she’d go first. And they would go in order to Mallory, who’d gotten thirty-four years with him. Not that anyone thought Mallory was any luckier for it than they were. 

Nick had assumed that his parents would live to an older age, and that in general, parents shouldn’t die before their kids hit forty. So in his mind, John and Dee would be in their early seventies when Claire hit forty, and that is when he should reasonably expect to lose them. It’s not like he didn’t know people died young, but he was pretty certain that it would happen to other people, not to the Pikes. 

All those assumptions had come crumbling down when John had been diagnosed with colon cancer less than a year earlier. Despite surgeries and radiation and round of chemotherapy that left him weak and requiring copious blood transfusions, the cancer grew. First to his peritoneum then to the liver. The past few weeks, his body had begun to break down, making him unable to walk. John decided he wanted to spend his last days at home with his family. A rotating schedule of hospice nurses were in and out. 

He had few lucid moments anymore. Dee suspected today would be the last day that he had any moments well enough that he could talk to them. So the family had gathered and had gone in one by one. They were asked to make their visits short, no more than ten minutes, so everyone could get a chance. 

Nick looked up when the door to the dining room (which had been converted into a makeshift hospital room) opened. Tears were streaming down Margo’s face and she clutched an envelope to her chest. She ran up the stairs without acknowledging any of her siblings. 

Nick stood up slowly and made his way into the dining room. John lay on the hospital bed with his eyes closed. Nick was used to seeing dying people from working at the hospital, so he wasn’t shocked by his father’s gaunt frame and the morphine drip in his hands. There was a stack of envelopes clutched tightly in John’s hand, though he appeared to be asleep.

“Dad?” Nick whispered.

John opened his eyes in surprised and looked a little confused for a moment before giving a small smile, “Nicky,” he whispered. 

Nick sat down on the chair next to the bed and took his dad’s hand. “Hi,” he said stupidly. 

“What do you tell the families of your patients when their loved one is dying?” John asked. 

“Um,” Nick gulped, his mind suddenly blank. Because he realized that no matter what he told his patients, it didn’t help them swallow the reality of their loss. “I tell them that their loved one fought hard, even if he didn’t. And I tell them that their passing was peaceful even if it wasn’t.”

“I do feel at peace,” John assured him. 

“OK.”

“If I tell you that you were my favorite, will you believe me?”

Nick laughed a little, wiping the tears from his face, “No. I’ll assume you’re telling all of us that.”

John smiled, “You always were the smartest though.” John’s eyes drifted shut and he seemed to fall back to sleep. Nicky stroked his dad’s hand a few times. After a couple minutes, John opened his eyes, “I wrote you a letter.” He raised his arm pitifully and Nick leaned across the bed and pulled the stack of envelopes from his fathers hand. 

Nick flipped quickly through the stacked, there were six remaining envelopes, all except one were slim as though it held no more than one or two pages. Nick pulled his own out. His was thicker than the others. “Thanks,” he said to John, not knowing if it was the right thing to say.

“Don’t open it yet,” John said. 

“Claire was reading hers,” he said, hoping she wasn’t denying her father one of his last requests. 

“Your letter is different,” John said quietly. “You need to wait until after the funeral.”

“Um. OK,” Nick agreed. 

There was a pause, and John beckoned Nick to him. Nick leaned down and gave John a soft kiss on the cheek. John mumbled, “You’re the one I chose to give this letter to, Nicholas. I didn’t have a favorite kid, but I have one I trusted most with some information.”

“Should I be worried?” Nick asked curiously leaning back a little. He was now very anxious to know what the letter held.

“No,” John said. “But when you read it, remember who I was. Remember that I loved you, and remember that I wasn’t crazy.”

John’s eyes fluttered closed again and Nick realized his time was about up. He watched his father’s chest rise and fall slowly and evenly, then kissed his father’s cheek again and said, “Good-bye, Dad.”

John snored lightly in response.


	2. Memory

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick leaves Stoneybrook and reads his father's deathbed letter.

 

Nick stared out the window of his plane as it sped down the runway and lifted off. He watched as the buildings and cars grew ever smaller and finally disappeared altogether.

He’d had Vanessa drive him to the airport, since Byron wasn’t around, knowing she was the least likely to ask too many questions about what, exactly, he was doing. Because there was no way to explain to anyone why he was leaving his job at Stoneybrook General, leaving his girlfriend of nearly a year, and jetting off to Wales, of all places.

He’d told a few lies along the way. He’d made it seem like the research position he’d taken in Cardiff was a bigger deal than it was, so that Stoneybrook General would allow him to come back after a six month leave of absence. The reality is that there was one study he’d be working on, and only as a fact-checker. It was a win-win, because he got to spend six months in Cardiff, and the research team got to include the name of a Hopkins-trained physician in their study.  

He couldn’t even explain to himself really why he felt compelled to do this. His father had died and he’d left Nick this note that couldn’t be believed. He didn’t know why he had to go to Cardiff. Maybe he wanted to try to prove to himself that John _hadn’t_ been crazy. Because, despite John insisting on his deathbed that he wasn’t crazy, Nick couldn’t help but think that somewhere along the line - likely when he was sitting down to pen Nick’s notes, that John’s mind _had_ gone. And had gone bad.

Nick sighed a little, shifted in his seat and opened the letter, and reread for about the hundredth time.

_Dear Nicky,_

_I’m writing you this note because I’m dying, and I think the thing to do is to tell all of my children how much they are loved. I hope you know that, Nicky, that I loved you as much as I could._

_I loved that you were a brainy little science genius from the time you could speak. You took the time when you were a toddler to pick up bugs and inspect how they’d crawl up and down your arms. As soon as you learned to read you pestered for a subscription to National Geographic, and would go to the library and curl up with an anatomy book. That you became a doctor is a surprise to no one, least of all me. I love that you chose a profession that helps people. Because you aren’t just my little brainiac, you’re a completely decent human being. Your patients are lucky to have a man like you._

_When you were a kid, you were often on the outside looking in. I always felt a little bit guilty about that. You were the only non-triplet boy and the only non-girl singleton. I know it was hard for you to fit in, but I think that the trouble you had as a kid helped you be a kinder adult. At least, that’s what I tell myself to assuage myself of some guilt in not being able to help you out of your troublesome place in the family._

_Nick, you’re a man who can be trusted. And that’s why I’m choosing you out of all eight of the kids to confess this to. If I’ve had my chance to say good-bye to you, you heard me insist that I’m not crazy. But if my health took a dive earlier than I anticipated, I never got the chance to say it. Nick, I am not crazy. I’m not. I’ve never had delusions, never felt over depressed (even after my diagnosis, I didn’t feel like I needed antidepressants), I’ve never taken any hallucinogenic drugs. I think what I’m about to tell you is absolutely real._

_Do you remember when you were about eight years old, and there were alien sightings in Stamford? The aliens supposedly looked like the triplets’ Wandering Frog Men, and the triplets insisted I go on a search. I was found unconscious in the woods early the following morning with a head injury. It appeared a tree branch had knocked me out._

_It seemed suspicious to me at the time, that despite getting knocked out long enough to be unconscious for over twelve hours, that I never suffered any post-concussive symptoms. The doctors called me incredibly lucky, and maybe I was. But you’re a doctor. You see head injuries, so you must know that isn’t likely at all. Another suspicious thing? I left with one Wandering Frog Man toy and returned with two. The other one had a name scratched on the bottom of the foot. “Jack H.”_

_(By the way, I’ve instructed the triplets in each of their letters that YOU are to be given the entire Wandering Frog Man collection. They have no idea why, but we can let them think their old man had gone a little batty in his illness and that they must follow crazy old dad’s request. You and I will know differently.)_

_Years passed, and I would get occasional senses that I was forgetting something. Sometimes when I’d be close to your mother, I’d get a picture in my head of a man. But just as soon as it was there, it was gone. I learned to recognize these moments, when I’d seem out of touch with reality - just for tiny split seconds. I did a little research and discovered that it could have been a result of having that head injury years prior._

_I was happy with that answer, until these moments became more frequent and more pronounced and clearer. I never told your mother about them, because it seemed like something that would require some kind of neurological examination. And you know how I feel about going to doctors. (Obviously. If I’d gone to the doctor for another problem earlier, it might not have been too late to save me from cancer and you wouldn’t even be reading this note now.) So I kept it to myself, but as these visions and memories came back at me, I was starting to piece things together._

_Nick, I think that I really did see an alien, and I was kidnapped - not by the alien, but by other people hunting the alien. So much of what I remember is clear and so much is cloudy, and I’m certain that there are parts I don’t remember at all._

_Here are the memories clear to me. Lying handcuffed on a silver table. The word Torchwood, the place of Cardiff - a city in Wales. A man named Captain Jack Harkness, whose face I can see clearly in my mind. Brown hair and blue eyes, a wide smile, and wearing suspenders. I remember a woman named Gwen and a man named Owen. I don’t know their faces, but I do remember their names. I clearly remember Harkness showing me a Wandering Frog Man just like the triplets. I remember there being some kind of smell, but I can’t really describe it to you. The smell is the strongest of all the memories. Often I’d be lying next to your mother in bed, or when I’d lean in to kiss her after coming home from work and that’s when the smell would be the strongest. I admit I nearly called her Jack a couple of times and I didn’t even know why I nearly did that._

_Then there are the memories that are a little fuzzy. I vaguely recall drinking a cup of coffee. I vaguely recall giving Jack Harkness my phone so he could see pictures of my wife and children. (I don’t know why I would have done this). I vaguely recall the name Victoria Hartigan._

_And, I’m very embarrassed to admit this, Nick. I think I may have had sex with Jack Harkness. I don’t know why I would. I’m not gay. Obviously I have no problem with gay people (except for that one guy Byron dated in college, Mike, but we can all agree that was about his personality, not his being gay) but I’ve never even considered I might be anywhere near gay. A total zero on the Kinsey scale. But I can’t shake this memory, and everytime I try to concentrate harder on it, the fainter it seems to become._

_I’m not quite sure why I’m telling you this. I don’t expect that you have to do anything with this information. But I want someone to have this information, because I have a strong feeling that Torchwood has a deep reach, and if I was involved with them -even for a few hours two decades ago-I fear that someone may come calling, and I don’t want Dee or anyone else to get caught up in something bad. So you can do what you want with this information. Ignore it if you have to._

_But I did do one thing for you. I Google searched Jack Harkness, and I came up with the following (which I’ve included on the following pages). There was a WWII Captain named Jack Harkness and the photo looks familiar. This must have been my Captain Jack’s father or something. I Google searched Torchwood, and I came up with a few hits, mostly conspiracy theorists in and around Cardiff.  The strange part about all this is that I would search Torchwood, find a few hits, then search again days later, and those hits would have disappeared. I began printing out pages that I found knowing they’d be gone soon. I’ve also included those pages. Some of what you’ll read on those pages sounds even crazier than anything I’ve written here, so I have no idea how much of it is true._

_Nick, I do love you. I love you so much, that I do feel guilty about weighing you down with this type of insanity. Just know that whatever you decide to do with this information, I’m on your side. Ignore it, investigate it, whatever. It’s up to you. I just ask that you keep it confidential, until such a time you think it would be better to open up. (And that, I will leave entirely in your corner)._

_I’m sorry I’m dying. I’m sorry that I won’t get to see you in your later thirties and into your forties and fifties. I’m sorry I’m missing out on any future children you may have. I’m sorry I’ll miss extra chances to talk to you. Please know that I die loving my family with my whole heart._

_Love,_

_Dad_

 

Nick looked up at the back of the seat in front of him. The letter had stopped affecting him quite as badly as it had the first dozen times he’d read it. Those times, he couldn’t not cry. He couldn’t not feel amazed at what he was reading. He couldn’t not get that knot in his stomach when his dad admitted to possibly having a gay affair while possibly drugged or something.

Nick knew, as did all the Pike kids, that they were loved to bits by their parents. He didn’t need to read it to know it, but it was still a nice thing to read.

He folded the letter and put it back into the knapsack under the seat in front of him. He closed his eyes, remembering the good times he’d had with his father. Because this is something he needed to do to make it seem like jetting of to Wales was a good idea.

Nick never convinced himself of this fact.

 


	3. Follow

Nick had been in Cardiff for just under a month, and he’d managed to find his way around the city, at least in the mile radius around the house where he was renting a room. He managed to find his way around the neighborhood area well enough to know where to get good take-out, where to go for a drink, and where the public library was.

He also, on a total whim, learned his way around the docks. There was something creepy about the docks in Cardiff and it made him feel as though if anything alien was going to happen, it would be there.

The time Nick spent in the pubs was spent drinking just enough to give him courage to approach strangers and ask if they’d heard of Torchwood. He’d taken to carrying a Wandering Frog Man around in his pocket (he always took the one with Jack H. written on the foot) and asking people if they’d ever seen anything like it in real life.

Most of the time, people would look at him oddly and say they’d never heard of Torchwood, and had no idea what the Wandering Frog Man was. But generally they were friendly about it. Nick had assumed that his American accent made it seem as though he were just a slightly odd tourist, which, he guessed he actually _was_.

But there was one night in the pub when the answers he’d received were different. The bartender overheard Nick asking a group of women at a hen party about the Wandering Frog Man. The women giggled and said no. Nick stayed at their table a while longer, happily flirting with all the women, minus the bride to be. When Nick got up to refill drinks, the grizzled old bartender said to him, “Boy. You might want to quit nosing about with your talk of those creatures.”

Nick had been concentrating on his quest to fill drinks for a couple of very pretty women who seemed charmed by his accent, so he said, “What?”

“The toy you got in your pocket,” the man said, “If you know what’s good for you, you’ll stop asking around about it.”

“You’ve seen them, then?” Nick asked.

“I have,” the man nodded. “Others have too, but funny thing about that is people who see them and talk about them sometimes end up dead. Or with blank memories of the night they seen ‘em.”

“Blank memories?” Nick asked.

“Yes. ‘Swhy it’s best you just forget about it. Whatever you’re trying to find out, you’re better off not knowing.”

“Have you heard of Torchwood, then?” Nick asked.

“Can’t say I have,” the man admitted.

“Do you know a man named Jack Harkness?” Nick pressed on.

“No. But if this Torchwood and Jack Harkness have something to do with them creatures, well, they aren’t people you need to be out looking for.”

“Thanks for the tip,” Nick said dryly. The bartender seemed to know Nick had absolutely no intention of heeding his warnings, and he scowled as he began filling Nick’s drink order.

Nick drank with the women, had a great time and even took one of the women home with him. If she was less than impressed by Nick’s living situation (renting a room from an elderly woman in a house that smelled frightfully like mothballs), she never let on. Sometimes, being a doctor came in handy.

The next morning, Mrs. Morris, Nick’s Landlady, pursed her lips as the girl left the house. She put a plate of eggs and bacon in front of Nick, who said “Thank you,” wondering if he should feel guilty about having had a woman over the previous night. It wasn’t something that he’d discussed with Mrs. Morris when he’d rented the room, but thought it might be too late to bring it up now.

Nick also realized he’d never asked Mrs. Morris about the Wandering Frog Men either. He pulled the toy out of his pocket and held it up, “Mrs. Morris. Have you ever seen these?”

She glanced up from her newspaper at the toy, “I never had kids. I don’t know much about toys.”

“I mean, have does this creature look familiar to you? I’ve heard of people seeing them around Cardiff.”

Mrs. Morris sighed, “I’ve lived here my whole life. Of course I’ve heard of these creatures. But have I ever seen one? No.”

“But you know people who’ve seen them?”

Mrs. Morris looked at him for a moment, “Yes. And if you want my opinion, you’re better off forgetting about the whole thing. People who are open about having seen them have a tendency to end up losing whole parts of their memories. So, even if I have seen one, I’d deny it to anyone who asked,” she added pointedly.

Nick got the message loud and clear. Mrs. Morris had seen them, but was denying it. And, despite only knowing her for the last month, he realized she would answer no further questions on the subject.

As Nick left the house that day, ready for another day of wandering the city, he began to realize that perhaps the best thing to do would be to ask older people - those who might have lived in Cardiff the longest- about the Wandering Frog Men. He wasn’t going to take the advice of Mrs. Morris or the old bartender. No way. He’d come to Cardiff for one reason: to figure out whether his father’s letter held any truth. And just as he’d started to think his dad really was crazy, the bartender happened to mention people seeing the Wandering Frog Men and ending up with blank memories.

This wasn’t going to stop Nick. This only made him more determined than ever to keep going, to keep searching, and to keep asking questions. His resolve strengthened, Nick continued on that day, showing people the Wandering Frog Man and asking if they’d ever seen anything like it.

_____

The resolve that Nick had found that day after his conversation with Mrs. Morris began to waver as one month became two. He had no luck seeing the creatures, or finding anyone else willing to talk about it.

He was beginning to think that the Wandering Frog Men were an old Cardiff wives’ tale, something that began as a lark and was passed down through generations. And that maybe only the older generation still knew about it, the younger generations having long ago abandoned the mythology in favor of skepticism made possible by the internet.

Nick was just thinking this, when he passed a new-model black SUV parked on the side of the street. He glanced at it quickly and kept walking before doing a double-take. There, at the bottom side of the SUV was the word ‘Torchwood.’

Nick looked around quickly. The SUV was parked in front of a coffee shop, but there was also a Greek restaurant, a bakery, a dry-cleaner, and a phone store on the same block. Nick leaned against the wall and pulled out his phone, pretending to be checking his email. He opened the camera and snapped a picture of the SUV and its license plate. Then he waited patiently.

After a few minutes, three people walked out of the coffee shop, a man with brown hair in a long trench coat, a gray-haired woman with wide hips, and a shorter man wearing a black t-shirt which showed his bulging muscles. Nick couldn’t hear what they were saying, but they got into the SUV.

The car pulled out into traffic and Nick began following it. The car got ahead of him, but was stopped in the right-turn lane at a red light the next block up. Nick ducked into an alley and ran the length of the block, coming out onto the next street just as the car passed him again.

He managed to follow it for a few more blocks, thanking heaven that the traffic was heavy and he could keep up with them on foot. It stopped in another right turn lane, and Nick ducked into another alley. He wasn’t fast enough this time, however because when he came out onto the street, he could just see the car speeding away, several blocks north. Nick jogged to where he’d last seen the car, and made a quick note to himself of the intersection.  

Despite having lost track of the car, Nick felt good and energized by his luck in having discovered it. He was really beginning to think his dad had gone mad, and seeing the car labeled Torchwood made him feel that he was getting close to something. He didn’t know exactly what he was getting close to, but he felt that he was close.

He’d ended up in a part of the city he hadn’t yet explored, so he wandered around a little bit more, making sure to check street names. He was near the bay, and suddenly he realized he was in a little open plaza. He looked at a sign and saw a building called Millennium Centre, which appeared to be a concert hall. It was a really pretty area of the city, and, forgetting about the black car for a moment, Nick began wandering around.

A plaque on a wall indicated that this was called Roald Dahl Plass. Nick smiled as he pulled out his phone and snapped a photo of the plaque, and then a few more of the plaza. He’d email these pictures to Mallory, who, despite her age, never outgrew her love of children’s literature. It was why she’d become a children’s librarian.

After a little more wandering, Nick decided he was unlikely to see the black car again and decided to go get some lunch.

At the cafe, Nick pulled out his laptop and connected his phone to it so he could download the photos to send to Mallory. As he was scanning through the pictures, something caught his eye in the corner of one of the pictures he’d taken of the Plass. He zoomed in as far as he could without the detail getting too fuzzy.

What he saw was a brown-haired man wearing a trench coat. If he wasn’t mistaken, that was the same man he’d seen getting into the black SUV just hours earlier.

Nick realized that he might be spending more time hanging out at Roald Dahl Plass.


	4. Intrude

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick finds his way in to Torchwood and finally meets Jack Harkness.

It didn’t take too long for Nick to realize that the man in the trench coat was a regular around Roald Dahl Plass. Nick was also quick to realize that this man was Jack Harkness. He looked remarkably like the photo from the internet his dad had printed out for him. From the glances he got, Harkness appeared to be only in his early forties at the oldest, making Nick wonder how old he’d been twenty-three years ago when John Pike supposedly met him. 

Harkness was a tricky bastard to follow. He seemed to appear out of nowhere, and at a certain point in the Plass, to disappear. Nick never managed to see exactly where he went. 

One day after a week of hanging out at the Plass, in the same twenty square foot area he was sure Harkness always came and went from, Nick got sick of it. He left hours before dark and began the trek back to Mrs. Morris’ house, wondering to himself how he’d work up the nerve to talk to Harkness. 

He hadn’t gotten farther than three blocks when the black SUV slid into a parking spot right next to him. A window rolled down and the older woman Nick had seen weeks earlier coming out of the coffee shop peeked her head out, “Gave up early today,” she said. 

Nick looked around to see if she was speaking to him, and realizing she was he leaned down to get a closer look. She was alone in the SUV. There was some very official looking equipment on the center console. He couldn’t see what was in the back very well. “I’m sorry?” He asked. “Who are you?”

“I’m Gwen Cooper,” she answered. 

Nick paused briefly at the mention of her name. His dad had remembered a woman named Gwen, but he kept his face passive, not wanting to give any information away. “I’m Nick.”

Gwen stuck her hand out the window and Nick shook it. “Get in,” Gwen said nodding her head in the direction of the passenger seat. 

Nick hesitated, but only briefly. His desire to learn more about Torchwood easily trumped his fears about what this situation would bring. “Ok,” he nodded as he rounded the car and plopped in the passenger seat. 

Gwen drove off, “Jack’s anxious to meet you,” she said. 

“Oh yeah?” Nick asked. 

“Mmm-hmm,” Gwen nodded. “We’ve noticed you hanging around the Plass the last few days. Jack was sure you’d approach him at some point, but you haven’t. I finally took pity on you and decided if Jack wouldn’t come to you, I’d bring you to Jack.”

“Thanks.” Nick paused, “I think.”

Gwen smiled and Nick decided he rather liked her smile. It was gap-toothed and genuine. “Don’t thank me yet. I don’t even know what connection you and Jack have. He’s often cagey about these things.”

“I guess he would be,” Nicky said, struggling to comment in a way that didn’t show off how ignorant he was about Jack Harkness. 

Gwen pulled up near some run-down shops on the bay. “We’re here,” she announced. 

Nick was confused, “Where’s here?”

“Torchwood,” Gwen said. She pointed to one shop, “It’s through there.”

Nick looked at the tiny unassuming tourist info shop. It didn’t even look like a proper shop, just a tiny ramshackle stand. “You’re kidding,” Nick said. 

Gwen smiled again, “Come on,” she said, sliding out the drivers seat. After only a moment’s hesitation, Nick got out of the passenger side and followed her into the shop.

The shop held nothing but a few manky pamphlets about Cardiff, most of which looked as though they hadn’t been updated in years. He wondered briefly if this was intentional; a way to keep people out. 

Gwen disappeared behind a door behind the counter and Nick followed her, surprised to find himself in an elevator which went down without any buttons to be pressed. 

A couple years earlier, Nick was getting off his shift at the hospital and decided to run down to the lab to see if his father’s biopsy report had come back. It had, and Nick looked at it and he became the first to find out that his father had cancer. He was going to have dinner with his parents right after he left the hospital, but he technically wasn’t even allowed to have looked at his father’s records because he wasn’t his father’s treating physician. 

So that night, at dinner, Nick had to keep an absolutely straight face and not let on to anyone that he knew for a fact that John had cancer, and that it was fairly far gone and that his chances of living were not great. Even when his dad asked him about it, Nick shrugged his shoulders and said, “Doctor Levenstein will give you call when he hears something.”

Keeping a straight face for _that_ was nowhere near as difficult as keeping a straight face as he descended into the Torchwood Hub. 

He and Gwen made it to the ground level, with Nick trying his hardest to look around and take in everything, while maintaining a passive face. He did not want to give anything away to these people. He wanted them to believe that he was the one in control, but looking around he realized he was probably in over his head. 

The hub was a large open room, with a center console crammed with computers and other gadgetry that Nick couldn’t even begin to put a name to. Two people were at the console staring at a computer screen talking quietly to each other, a very pretty Indian woman and Jack Harkness. They didn’t look up as Nick and Gwen got to the ground. 

Gwen cleared her throat as Nick stepped off the lift behind her. Jack and the other woman both looked up, “Look who I found,” Gwen said, smiling. 

Jack looked unsurprised to see Nick. He gave a slight sideways smile and said, “Nicky Pike. What brings you here?”

For whatever reason, Nick was not shocked that Jack knew who he was. As Nick glanced around the large room, he began to feel as though Torchwood knew a lot more than he might be comfortable with. 

“Captain Jack Harkness,” Nick began, and Jack nodded and began walking toward him, extended a hand to shake. Nick shook Jack’s hand, but wasn’t sure what to say next, because his mind suddenly blanked and he wasn’t sure exactly what he was doing there. After a few seconds pause, he blurted out, “My father died.”

Jack’s eyebrows went up and his mouth opened in a slight ‘o’ shape. He seemed momentarily at a loss for words before saying, “I’m sorry to hear that.” Another slight pause, “How?”

“Colon cancer,” Nick answered. 

Jack took a step back, and repeated, “I’m sorry.”

Nick looked around, “So this is Torchwood then?”

“Yeah,” Jack said, turning around. “You’ve met Gwen Cooper, she’s supposed to be retired, but she’s here just as often as when she was on payroll,” Jack smiled at her, his white teeth dazzling. There was something familiar about Jack’s smile that Nick couldn’t quite place. 

Gwen smiled back in a flirty way, “What can I say?” she shrugged. 

“That’s Radha, she’s our tech genius” Jack said pointing to the woman at the computers, who was looking on in interest. Nick waved to Radha, who waved back, looking entirely unconcerned about Nick’s presence. “And asleep on the couch over there,” Jack pointed to a back corner where Nick could just make out a couch behind a coffee table piled high with pizza boxes and chinese take-out boxes, “is Mac, our police liaison, and Gwen’s replacement,” Jack looked at Nick conspiratorily and said, “She picked her own replacement and still can’t go into a proper retirement.” 

Nick smiled slightly, unsure what to say. He continued to look around, trying hard to not think very hard about the fact that these people knew about aliens. Their knowledge was so far above what he could even consider a possible line between fact and fiction. It made him dizzy to think about the prospect of alien life. 

“So,” Jack said as he walked back toward Radha and the computers. “You came all the way to Cardiff and hung around the Plass for over a week to let me know your dad died?”

Nick followed Jack to the center of the room and the console of computers, “Not exactly,” he answered, “I wanted to give you this,” Nick reached into his pocket and pulled out the Wandering Frog Man and held it out to Jack. 

Nick watched Jack’s face carefully to see if any hint of emotion would come through. Jack quirked a smile, slightly sideways, and grabbed the toy out of Nick’s hand. 

While Jack betrayed a little emotion, Gwen audibly gasped at seeing the toy, and Radha looked up, suddenly interested. “Jack!” Gwen exclaimed. “That man who had that from the States, when the rift opened over there.”

Jack nodded his head toward Nicky, “This is his son,” Jack explained to Gwen. 

“Hi,” Nick waved to her and Radha.

“This is Nicky Pike,” Jack introduced them. 

“Nick. I go by Nick now,” he corrected Jack. 

“Nick, then.” Jack said agreeably. 

“How’d you know about us?” Gwen asked. 

“My dad,” Nick answered, taking a few steps to the right so he could look over Radha’s shoulder and see what was on the computer screen. Radha glared at him for a moment, and stepped aside so she was blocking his view. It didn’t matter, Nick had no clue what he was looking at anyway. There were televisions with frames of different video surveillance. Nick found this unsurprising, considering CCTV monitoring was much more common in the UK than in the US.

“Why were you the only kid who came?” Jack pressed. “Aren’t there seven others?”

“I guess I’m the only one who wanted to,” Nick said dryly.

“Hmmm,” Jack set his mouth in a thin frown.

“Actually, I’m the only one who knows,” Nick corrected quickly. John had seemed to think Torchwood was dangerous, and Nick saw no reason to put his siblings in danger. John had told him and him only for a reason, however dubious it was. 

Gwen watched this interaction with interest, and when there was a slight pause, she chimed in, “So what do you do, Nick?”

“Like, for a living?” he asked, because he realized that Gwen and Jack had been watching him spending entire days hanging out in the Plass. “I’m a doctor.”

Gwen’s face lit up and Radha turned quickly to Jack, her eyes wide. “He’s a doctor!” Radha said excitedly to Jack, “We need-”

But Jack cut her off, “No.”

“Jack,” Gwen said quietly through clenched teeth. “He already knows about us, it can’t hurt.”

“I said no,” Jack said curtly.

Gwen and Radha looked taken aback by Jack’s tone of voice.

“Why don’t you come with me to my office?” Jack asked Nick, fiddling with the Frog Man toy still clutched in his hands. He turned to Gwen, “Why don’t you bring us some coffee?” Nick had the impression that Jack wasn’t so much asking him to go to the office, or Gwen to get them coffee, but that these were demands. 

As Nick followed Jack up a short flight of stairs leading to an office, he had a sudden realization who Jack reminded him of - the triplets. Not that he looked exactly like them, because while they looked somewhat alike, the resemblance wasn’t striking. But expressions on his face. The quick sideways smile he’d given on seeing the toy reminded Nick of Adam when he was being his most smart-assed. The slight frown on hearing that the other Pike kids knew about Torchwood was reminiscent of Byron. It was the exact look of disapproval that came over Byron’s face often enough that Nick had it memorized. 

Jack nodded toward a chair, and Nick took a seat. “You really shouldn’t have come,” Jack said as he took a seat behind his desk. 

“Do you need a doctor?” Nick asked. “Because if someone’s sick, I can help.”

“We don’t need a doctor,” Jack said firmly. “Look,” he closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose, “I appreciate you letting me know your dad died, and I really am sorry for your loss.”

“But I shouldn’t have come,” Nick supplied. 

“No,” Jack shook his head. “I’m wondering exactly how much your dad told you.”

“He told me enough to get me here, didn’t he?” Nick said evasively. 

“How much information did he give you?” Jack asked, he was still fiddling with the wandering frogman toy.

Nick shrugged, and decided to avoid answering as long as he could, “You know, in these letters he wrote to each of us kids before he died, he told the triplets that they had to give me the entire collection of those wandering frogmen. The three of them didn’t understand it, and my brother Byron was kind of pissed because he has six kids at the moment, three are fostered, and his boys loved to play with them.”

Jack slid the toy back to Nick, “You can take them back to Byron when you leave.”

“You wrote your name on the bottom of this one,” Nick pointed out, turning the toy over so that Jack could see. “My dad came here with one of these and he left with two. The extra one he left with had your name on its foot. Did you want him to remember you?”

Jack shifted uncomfortably before leaning forward on his desk, hands clasped in front of him. He appeared to be getting ready to lecture Nick, and in this position and with this look on his face, Nick was struck by how very much he looked like Byron. For the first time, Nick began to feel that there was something unusual about Jack Harkness, beyond even the fact that he worked as an alien hunter. Jack began to speak, “Nick, your dad saw an alien all those years ago, and we had to work to make sure he’d forget it. Not just the alien, but us. It’s not safe to know who Torchwood is. So if you’re asking did I slip this extra toy to your dad? Yes. But I just wanted him to have it because he had kids who were using the other toys and I didn’t need it for anything.”

“But you left your name on it,” Nick pressed.

“I did,” Jack answered. 

“And you’re not going to tell me why.”

“No,” Jack said. “I kind of regretted it ever since I did it.”

“Why?” Nick asked. “Why did you have to modify his memory?”

“For his own safety,” Jack said, his voice full of reassurance. As he spoke the door opened and Gwen came in with two cups of coffee. She handed one to Jack and the other to Nick, who thanked her as she walked out. 

Jack took a sip of his coffee, and said “If there’s one thing we do right at Torchwood, it’s make coffee.”

Nick smiled slightly, “Do you make better alien hunters or coffee makers?” he asked sardonically. 

Nick had just put his lips to the mug when he had a moment of realization. _His dad’s letter._ John had said in the letter that he remembered drinking a cup of coffee. Nick put his mug down without taking a sip. 

“Would you rather have tea?” Jack asked.

Nick reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet. He pulled a business card sized piece of paper out and tore a long strip off it. He began to speak to Jack, “In my first year of medical school, my sister Margo was in her senior year in college. She went out to a bar with some of her friends and someone slipped something in her drink. Do you know what a roofie is?”

Nick looked up at Jack.

“Yes,” Jack answered.

Nick continued as though Jack hadn’t spoken, “It’s called the date-rape drug. It was incredibly scary. Luckily Margo had friends with her who were able to see her home safely. But, God. Think what would have happened if she didn’t. I bought a stack of these papers and gave them to all my sisters, and to Byron because he was going through this post-breakup slutty guy at the gay bar phase. It’s basically a type of litmus paper, which can detect rohipnol, also called a roofie.” 

Jack was staring with a slight frown on his face as Nick stuck the paper into his coffee, pulled it out and waited five seconds. The paper changed color. “So my question to you Jack Harkness, is why are you slipping me a roofie?”


	5. Blood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick forces Jack to tell him the truth.

Jack looked at Nick quietly, as though carefully regarding what he was going to say next. Before he could utter a word, Nick spat out, “You son of a bitch!” He stood up and walked toward the door.

Jack stood up and rushed to the door, stood in front of it, hands out to the side and said, “Don’t go,” he plead.

“Get out of my way,” Nick said softly.

“No,” Jack said. “Let me explain.”

“You gave my dad a date rape drug,” Nick said, “And you used it for its exact purpose.”

Jack’s eyes widened, “ _No!_ ” he insisted. “No I didn’t.”

“He remembered it,” Nick said, teeth clenched. His hands instinctively tightened into fists. “You son of a bitch!” he said, again as he swung his fist directly at Jack’s face.

Jack didn’t move, taking the punch directly to his jaw. But he was fast - faster than Nick had anticipated and within seconds Jack had a hold of both of Nick’s hands and had twisted them behind his back. “Let go,” Nick said, struggling to get free of Jack’s grip, and when that failed, trying to kick Jack in the shins.

“Stop struggling,” Jack said, “I want you to hear me out.”

“I don’t want to hear what you have to say,” Nick shouted still struggling. But, damn, Jack was stronger than he looked and wasn’t giving Nick an inch of slack.

The door opened, and a man squeezed himself in behind Jack. “Need help, boss?” he asked.

“Just tell our visitor here that I’m not about to hurt him.”

Mac leaned around and looked Nick in the eye and said, “Don’t worry. You can trust him.”

Nick stopped struggling so hard and looked at Mac. He was a big, beefy man wearing a green polo shirt that stretched across his broad shoulders and chest. His arms were well-muscled and tattooed. He had short strawberry-blonde hair and wide green eyes. Nick didn’t say anything, but relaxed himself as a way of saying he wouldn’t put up a fight. Nick figured if he couldn’t get by Jack, there was no way he’d get by Mac.

“Thanks,” Jack said to Mac. “Give us a few minutes.” He turned his attention to Nick, “Please have a seat,” he plead as Mac quietly left the room.

Nick sat in the seat across from Jack’s desk. Rather than sitting behind the desk, Jack took the seat next to Nick and scooted the chair a little closer to Nick’s. “What do you want to know?” he asked, defeated.

Nick looked at him, “Whatever you tell me, I want it to be the truth.”

Jack nodded.

Nick licked his lips, “Did you roofie my dad?”

“No.” Jack shook his head. “We use a drug called Retcon. Rohipnol is one of the ingredients, but not the main active ingredient. It’s a mixture of several amnesiatics. It’s not legally for sale.”

“Why did you give it to him?”

“He saw these aliens called weevils. There’s a rift in time and space located directly above Cardiff, that’s why we’re here and that’s how the weevils get through. Twenty-three years ago, the rift replicated itself over Stamford Connecticut for reasons we’ve never figured out, and a few weevils got through. Your dad saw one as Gwen and another agent Owen were staked out in Stamford, who tranquilized him and brought him here.”

“Why couldn’t they have just given him the Retcon there?”

“They weren’t sure if he’d come through the rift. They brought him here to be put under Torchwood protection if it turned out he was from another place or time. We’ve never had great luck getting things back through the rift,” Jack explained.

“But why not just tell him the truth?”

“The truth about Torchwood has a way of getting people into trouble.”

“How do I know you’re telling me the truth?” Nick asked.

Jack smiled somewhat ruefully, “I guess you don’t,” he said after a moment’s pause to think about Nick’s question. “But you’re a clever man, Nick. You figured out that your coffee had something in it. You figured out where to go to find us. I’m not lying to you, because I trust that if I do, you’ll find a way to figure it out.”

Nick looked down at his hands, trying to decide if he could trust Jack. He decided he probably couldn’t, but decided to keep asking questions anyway. “Do the weevils look like my brothers’ wandering frog men?”

“Yes,” Jack nodded. “Many years ago Torchwood commissioned sixteen of them, then never put them to much use.”

“How did they end up as my brothers’ toys?”

“You had a long ago relative who worked at Torchwood. I assume she swiped them for her son, who then passed them down to his children. Your father told me that the triplets had been given to him by your Uncle Peter.”  

Nick bit his lip, knowing he had to ask the question that was hanging in the air, unsure he really wanted to know the answer. “What….um…” Nick pinched the bridge of nose before asking in a rush, “Did you sleep with my dad?”

Jack paused, and appeared to be thinking hard about how to answer the query. “That was a long time ago, Nick,” he finally said cautiously.

Nick nodded in understanding, “So you did.” He shuddered slightly and added, “He insisted he’s not gay.”

“He probably isn’t,” Jack said.

Nick looked at Jack in disbelief, “I’m not an idiot. I know there’s, like, a spectrum or whatever. But at the end of my dad’s life, he got a little….confesssion-y. So him denying being gay to me kind of screams, you know, not gay.”

“Do you know much about pheromones?” Jack asked.

The question caught Nick by surprise. “A bit. But the study of pheromones in humans is spurious at best.”

Jack laughed hollowly, “Believe me when I say that pheromones are a real thing.”

Nick paused a moment and stared hard at Jack, trying to take in the conversation he was having with the man. “So you were irresistible? You’re swimming in pheromones?” he asked.

“I am,” Jack nodded.

“Then why don’t I have the urge to jump your bones?”

“We’re blood-related.”

Whatever answer Nick had been expecting, _that_ was not it. His mouth was agape, and he knew he looked like an idiot, but he seemed to have lost the ability to close it. “What?” he asked, though it probably came out as something closer to “wuuuh?”

“We share a relative. Victoria Hartigan.”

“Jesus Christ,” Nick whispered. “So my mom is….”

“Related to me,” Jack nodded. “She probably inherited my pheromones.”

“Oh God," Nick said. "They were all over each other. All the time, constantly kissing and touching their whole lives. And, you know, eight kids. So they weren't exactly using the bed to sleep exclusively."

Jack stayed silent for several minutes, giving Nick a chance to wrap his head around off of this information. There were aliens, he was in an organization called Torchwood in Wales where they trap aliens. His dad was brought here long ago, and had gay sex with this myster man, who it turns out is a relative, because of his strong pheromones. Then his memory was wiped, but not well enough, and Nick was working on this jigsaw puzzle of a mystery. "Jesus Christ," he whispered again. Then he looked up at Jack, "How old are you?"

Jack looked taken aback, “I….what?”

Nick surveyed him carefully, “You look about forty, maybe forty-three at the absolute oldest. You were basically a kid when my dad was here - nineteen, twenty?”

“Age is a complicated thing,” Jack answered, his voice carefully measured.

“No, it really isn’t,” Nick explained. “You take this year, 2036, and subtract the year you were born and, boom. There’s your age. I’ll give you that pheromones are a complicated thing, but age really isn’t.”

Jack smiled sideways, “Didn’t anyone ever tell you it’s rude to ask someone their age?”

“It’s rude to ask a _lady_ her age.”  Jack stayed silent, obviously not willing to answer the question. Nick thought a moment. “Got it,” he said. “There’s a time rift here and you were all up in it at some point and that screwed with your age, right?”

Jack quirked an eyebrow and managed to look impressed, “You really are a clever man,” he said. He started to say something else, but Mac rushed into the office.

“Big rift activity near here, boss,” he said.

Jack stood up, grabbed his gun holster from a rack in the office, “Stay here,” he commanded Nick.

“Can I come?” Nick asked eagerly.

“No,” Jack answered. “Stay here,” and he rushed out of the office.

Nick stood in Jack’s doorway and watched as Jack, Radha, and Mac gathered on the lift. His eyes followed them until they were gone.  When he was sure they were gone, he clambered down the stairs, fully intent on snooping around the hub.

Gwen stepped in front of him, “What are you looking for?” she asked innocently, knowing full well that he was intending to look around.

“Why didn’t you go with the others?”

“I’m retired,” she reminded him. “My body can’t keep up with those young ones anymore.”

“Can you show me around?” Nick asked, realizing that she wasn’t going to leave him alone.

“What do you want to see?”

Nick shrugged, “Whatever you can show me. I’ve never been in an alien-hunter’s headquarters before. Shocking though that might sound to you.”

Gwen laughed a little, “All right. But there’s a lot of classified stuff here, so I can’t show you everything.”

“Fine,” Nick said anxiously.

“All right,” Gwen walked toward the center of the room and pointed to the computers and tech that were there. “This is where we monitor rift activity.”

Nick glanced at the screen. Three of them showed charts which vaguely looked like the heart-rate monitors for a patient with tachycardia. “I can’t read this at all,” Nick admitted.

Gwen laughed, “I don’t know much about them either. Radha recently re-did our entire monitoring system. Something about sonic waves.” Gwen shrugged.

“What are these?” Nick asked, pointing to the other monitors, most of which had security camera footage.

“CCTV feeds. Closed-Circuit Television.”

“Yeah, I know. Do the people know you’re watching them?”

Gwen shrugged again. “They know the CCTVs are there.” She looked at Nick and noticing the appalled look on his face, “I know these aren’t as common in the States, but most people here are all right with them.”

“What’s this one?” Nick pointed to the last monitor. It was front and center in the console, but was turned off.

Gwen shook her head, “That’s one of the things you can’t see.”

She’d sounded so apologetic about it, Nick decided to not push the issue further, though he was dying to see what secrets were hidden there.

“What kind of doctor are you?” She asked.

“An intensivist.” Gwen looked confused so Nick continued, “I don’t see patients in an office. I work for the hospital in the intensive care unit. Some places call us hospitalists.”

“Do you like it?” Gwen asked.

“Yeah,” Nick said. “I see a lot of bad things, though. It’s not a place for the faint of heart.”

“A lot of death?”

“Yes. About twenty percent of patients who come in to the ICU will die within days.”

Gwen swallowed and looked toward a set of stairs that led downward. “Do you want to see our medical bay?”

Nick raised his eyebrows, “Sure,” he said eagerly. He got the impression that Gwen was unsure about whether Jack would approve of this.

“Follow me,” she tilted her head toward the steps.

Nick followed her, and as they descended the stairs, he found himself in an open round room that shone with stainless steel. The center of the room was taken up by a stainless steel table, complete with shackles. Stainless bins held medical equipment, and along the wall were drawers that Nick immediately recognized as morgue beds.

Nick snooped through the medical equipment, noting that everything seemed to be a few years old, but looked perfectly clean and in working order. “May I?” he asked, running his fingers lightly over the drawer pull on of the morgue beds.

“We don’t keep bodies there anymore,” Gwen said.

Nick pulled, unsure what he’d find, and was disappointed to see that this was used merely as pharmaceutical storage. “Well that’s a let down,” Nick said. “I was hoping to see an alien body.”

Gwen laughed. “We have some. But, you know, classified.” Nick nodded in understanding.

“Do you have a medic on staff?” he asked.

“Usually,” Gwen said. “We’re between doctors at the moment.”

“Is that what you and Radha were trying to say to Jack?”

Gwen nodded, “I don’t know why he cut us off so quickly.”

“He doesn’t even know if I’m a good doctor,” Nick said, suddenly wanting to open up about what was nagging him. “I picked up on the fact that you need a doctor here and I can’t figure out why he’s so opposed to it.”

“I don’t know,” Gwen said. “But Jack always has his reasons.”

“We’re related, you know.”

Gwen raised her eyebrows, “You and Jack?”

Nick nodded, “I don’t know how, exactly. We share a common ancestor - a woman who worked at Torchwood over a century ago. And the stupid thing is, the first person I thought of was my sister, Mallory, who has this obsession with successful career women. Especially women from a time when women weren’t really educated. So all I can think is that I want to call Mallory, but I’m afraid if I tell, fucking anyone about all this,” he waved his hand to indicate Torchwood in general, “I’ll end up dead. Or lying in a wooded area with a modified memory like my dad did.”

Gwen looked at Nick thoughtfully. “Jack is a lone soul,” she explained. “He doesn’t have a lot of family, so it’s likely he’s trying to protect the one he has.”

Nick shrugged, still bothered by Jack’s insistence on him not helping Torchwood. Not that Nick even knew whether or not he’d want to join. He was fairly certain that Jack would find a way to slip him a Retcon and ship him back to Stoneybrook. Though Nick may not have certain about joining Torchwood, he was certain that he didn’t want to forget what he’d seen here.

Nick poked around the medical bay a little longer, checking on the stores of medicine and medical equipment, all of which was fairly up to date. “Who pays the bills?” he asked suddenly.

“Hm?” Gwen asked.

“How does a secret organization get paid?”

“We’re on the royal payroll,” Gwen answered.

“What?” Nick asked.

Gwen laughed a little, “It seems incredible, right? We work directly for the Queen. Parliament doesn’t even know we exist.”

Nick found this fascinating, “Why?” he asked.

Gwen shrugged, “Jack knows more about it. Torchwood was started in the late 1800’s by Queen Victoria after she found out about something supernatural. She created Torchwood….and here we are.”

“That’s kind of….that’s amazing.”

Gwen opened her mouth to respond, when they heard Jack shout from the lift. Gwen and Nick ran to meet them, and they came upon Jack and Radha holding up Mac, who was barely able to stand on his own and bleeding profusely from the side of his gut.

“Something slashed him!” Jack said as he and Radha rushed to get Mac to the medical bay, laying him down on the metal exam table.

Without thinking about what he was doing, Nick pulled on a pair of gloves, and went to work.

 


	6. Family

Nick didn’t even stop to think what he was doing when he opened the supply drawers and pulled out anesthesia, antibiotic wash, scalpels, and suturing materials, all of which he knew the location of, thanks to Gwen allowing him to snoop. He was acting on pure doctor instinct, and so he missed, as he snapped on a pair of gloves, the look Jack shot Gwen. An incredulous look clearly accusing her of having shown Nick where everything was located. And he also missed the defiant look Gwen returned.

Nick turned to Mac and got to work. He cut Mac’s shirt off, and before he could even ask, Radha was there with a hazardous waste bin for Nick to throw it in. The room was silent as Nick administered a local anesthetic to the cut and waited a couple minutes for Mac to relax under its effects.

“Are you OK with me doing this while you’re awake?” Nick asked.

Mac grimaced, but nodded his consent. Nick bent over the other man and examined the wound closer. The active bleeding had already slowed, meaning that nothing major had been cut. He used the scalpel to open the wound a little more, and began washing it out thoroughly with saline and antibiotic washes. “I’m no plastic surgeon,” he said, as he began suturing the wound. “But I can see no major arteries were cut. Though you’re going to have a scar.”

“Fine,” Mac said through gritted teeth. “I don’t care.”

Nick concentrated on suturing the wound, doing his best to make the stitches as clean as possible. He glanced up at Jack for a moment, and noted that Jack was watching the proceedings carefully, but looking deeply unhappy. He also noticed blood around Jack’s collar and wondered how it had gotten there. Looking back down at Mac, Nick asked Jack, “He couldn’t go to the hospital then?”

Jack shrugged, a movement Nick was unable to see. “Sometimes we can get to the hospital, but it involves a lot of lying to doctors. And we were really close by.”

“He’ll be fine,” Nick said. “Nothing major was hit.  But what about your neck?”

“What about my neck?” Jack asked.

“The blood on your shirt,” Nick pointed out. “It obviously came from your neck, and there’s a lot of it, so I assume it’s not just a surface wound.”

There was a deadly silence in the air. Nick looked up from his work in time to see Jack, Gwen, Radha and Mac all sharing an indefinable look. “What?” he asked.

“It’s Mac’s blood,” Jack answered quickly. “I was down when he got cut, and he fell on me.”

Nick didn’t believe that. Not for a second, but he chose not to push it. Instead he worked in silence while the others looked on.

When he was done, he looked on in satisfaction at his work. He didn’t need to give stitches often, so he was happy to see that the stitches looked even and, for the most part anyway, straight. “How are you feeling?” he asked Mac.

Mac looked down at his abdomen. “All right. Better than I thought I would.”

“Let’s just hope it didn’t impregnate you,” Gwen said sardonically.

Nick looked at Gwen for a moment, “What?” he asked.

“It happened to me once,” she said. “The night before my wedding. An alien impregnated me by scratching me.”

“That’s….” Nick began, though he didn’t even bother finishing the sentence. There weren’t words that could appropriately describe the situation Gwen had just described.

“Help me get Mac up to the couch to lie down,” Jack said to Gwen. They each took one of his arms, but Mac was feeling better now, and was able to bear more of his own weight.

Nick and Radha began cleaning up the medical bay. “Did you know about Gwen’s wedding?” he whispered to her, scrubbing his hands.  

Radha looked up the stairs, “Yeah. It’s a story Gwen likes to tell. I guess most of it’s true,” she said quietly, shrugging. “Listen, Gwen and Jack are going into his office. I want to show you something. We can finish cleaning up in a minute.”

“What is it?”

“Shhh. Just follow me.” Radha went up the stairs and made a right. Nick followed her closely, on tiptoes and trying to be as quiet as possible.

She went into the bathroom and turned on the light. She put her finger to her lips and whispered, “shhh.” Then she climbed onto the sink, reached up to the ceiling and opened a vent. “This vent is connected to Jack’s office,” she whispered climbing back to the floor. “Sometimes you can overhear things.”

Nick tilted his head so his ear was toward the vent, and sure enough he heard Jack’s voice, “...should have just taken him with us.”

“I didn’t show him anything confidential,” Gwen answered, she certainly sounded defensive. “But the medical bay isn’t. And it turned out for the best, didn’t it? He knew where everything was when you came back with Mac. If he hadn’t already known, we’d still be there helping him out. He did great with Mac, didn’t he?”

“He did, but that’s not the point.”

“So what is the point then, Jack? He’s a doctor. He knows about Torchwood. Torchwood needs a doctor.”

“It’s complicated.”

“He told me you’re related.”

Jack went silent. Nick glanced at Radha who was gaping at him, he nodded slightly at her.  

“Is that why?” Gwen pushed.

“Yes,” Jack said shortly after another lengthy pause. Nick wasn’t sure if Gwen said anything after that. But after several more seconds, Jack continued, “And it’s a direct line.”

“You mean…?” Gwen either drifted off, or finished her sentence in too quiet a voice for Nick and Radha to hear.

“He’s my great-great Grandson.”

The bathroom suddenly became blurry and seemed to swim before his eyes. He looked at Radha again, and was not comforted to see that she looked frightened and had taken a step or two away from him.

Nick swallowed hard and climbed up onto the counter and pressed his ear against the vent, afraid to lose another word. Jack’s voice continued, “When his dad appeared all those years ago, it was such a stupid coincidence. There was a Torchwood agent, Victoria Hartigan. And we had a son, Graham. And when Victoria died, Graham was raised by Victoria’s brother and his wife. Graham eventually had grand-daughter, Dee, and that’s Nick’s mom. Dee is my great-granddaughter and Nick is my great-great Grandson.”

Another pause, “Nick doesn’t know.” Gwen said it matter-of-factly, rather than like a question.

“He knows we’re related. He probably thinks I’m a distant cousin or something,” Jack paused again. Nick reflected that Jack was right. Nick was awful with genealogy, and could never remember exactly what a second cousin or third cousin was. Or what the phrases ‘once removed,’ or ‘twice removed,’ actually meant. Jordan was the geneaology buff, so when he’d mention that someone was their grandfather’s third-cousin once removed, Nick believed him without actually knowing what he was believing. Jack continued. “When his dad was here, I figured it out. And I’ve spent the last twenty-three years with a Google alert for all of them. I kept track of them that way. Social media accounts, articles, blogs, whatever. I know Nick graduated tenth in his medical school class at Johns Hopkins. I know that Mallory is in charge of the Children’s Library system in Stamford. I know that Byron is a foster parent through public records in Los Angeles. I bought this,” Jack paused and Byron heard a thud, “after Vanessa got her first poem published in it.”

Nick smiled to himself. He had the same book, Modern Journal of Poetry, and he didn’t even like poetry. He was pretty sure half of the sales of that journal were to Pike family members, rather than actual poetry fans.

“Jack,” Gwen sounded pitying now. “I get it.”

“No,” Jack said. “You don’t. You’ve got Rhys and Anwen. I haven’t felt protective of anyone since Ianto, and look how that turned out. I want to do this, Gwen. I want to protect him, he’s family.”

“You know he’s made for this type of work,” Gwen said, her voice so soft, Nick could barely hear it. There was a pause, and Nick was trying to guess what was happening, whether Jack was giving her a look, and what the look said.  “Jack, listen,” Gwen continued on. “He figured out we were here. He figured out how to get to us. He didn’t drink the coffee, so he obviously figured out something was in that, right?”

“Yes,” Jack said. Then he sighed loudly, “He was also asking questions about my age.”

There was another pause in the office, and a small squeak from Radha. She scrambled onto the counter next to Nick and whispered, “I know something’s up with Jack and his age. He can’t die, you know.” She pressed her ear against the vent next to his.

Nick was about to ask her what she meant, when Jack continued, “He guessed I came through the rift. Not exactly correct, but a damn good guess.”

“He’s got the right instincts,” Gwen said. “We just saw him with Mac, and what’d you say? Tenth in his class at Hopkins? We know he’s got the right stuff as a doctor.”

Nick heard some vague mumbling from Jack, unable to tell exactly what he was saying. Radha leaned closer to Nick and whispered, “She’s right. You were great.”

“What do you mean he can’t die?” Nick whispered back.

Radha shrugged, “That blood on his shirt? He got his throat slit by that thing that got Mac. Blood spurted everywhere,” Radha made a motion with her hands, like a fountain was coming out of her neck. “And he fell over and died, and two minutes later, he popped up, throat fine. It’s not the first time I’ve seen something like that happen.”

“How? Is it a rift thing?”

Radha shrugged again. “Getting information out of him is like drawing water from a stone.”

“Well then,” Gwen said, sounding loud and annoyed. Nick and Radha jumped at the suddenness of it. “What do you want to do with him? He knows about us, but he also knows about Retcon.”

Jack interrupted, “He’s also got seven siblings with whom he’s very close and from whom he probably couldn’t keep a secret. Gwen, we’ve got to find a way to get the Retcon in him and send him back to the States. I don’t want this for him.”

“Jack, when’s the last time you hired someone who had absolute instincts for the job? Someone who figured out you were here and wormed her way into the hub?”

“It was you, Gwen. You know that.”

“And I’m still here, aren’t I? Not everyone who works at Torchwood dies from working at Torchwood-”

“Most do,” Jack emphasized.

“Nick isn’t Ianto. Nick isn’t your son. You aren’t responsible for his well-being. He should be here, and you know it. Damn, Jack, you go on about not having any family and one of them pops up in front of you. Wouldn’t you want to keep him here?”

Jack mumbled something, Nick couldn’t tell what he was saying, but it sounded like he was using the words “safe, safety.”

“You’re being unreasonable,” Gwen had started sounding angry now. “Just ask him. Maybe he doesn’t even want to be here.”

Nick looked down at Radha. “I want to go. I need to get out of here.” He was feeling restless, feeling like he was trapped, and didn’t know why.

“I’ll come,” Radha said, jumping down from the counter after she reached up and closed the vent.

Nick was surprised, “We need to finish cleaning the medical bay first.”

Radha nodded, “I’ll help.”

Nick climbed down from the counter and followed her back to the medical bay. Nick stopped by the couch to check up on Mac, who had dozed off to sleep. Nick checked the stitched wound and decided it looked all right.

He and Radha made quick work of cleaning the medical bay. Nick was anxious to get out of there before having to talk to Jack Harkness again. He hoped Jack and Gwen would stay in the office for a while longer.

He was in luck. He and Radha finished cleaning with time to spare and they left together. “Want to come to my place?” Radha asked.

Nick nodded. “How is any of this even possible? How can Jack not die?” he asked her as they made their way out into the night toward Radha’s car.

Radha shrugged, “I knew there was something weird about him. I figured out about the not dying thing pretty quickly. I saw him get shot right in the chest and wake up from it minutes later. Those were a panicky few minutes for me though - Jack and I were alone. But that was nothing compared to the panic I felt when he came to.” Radha shook her head, remembering it all. “He explained it to me using the most vague terms possible, something about a time-vortex.”

“Time-vortex?” Nick asked. “I wonder if that has anything to do with this rift thing?”

Radha shrugged, “I think it must.”

“So Jack traveled here from the past?”

“I think the future,” Radha explained, then she caught herself, “Well, maybe the past. I was thinking there weren’t such things as time-vortexes in the past, but then again, what do I know? I didn’t know there was a rift until eight months ago.”

“This sounds so science-fictiony. You’ve been at Torchwood for eight months?”

Radha nodded, “I found the rift on my own,” she explained. “I was working on my PhD, and I discovered a sonic frequency disturbance where the rift is.  I was there most every night taking recordings of the frequencies using this home-made device I crafted. Jack had been watching me for weeks and I didn’t know it. When something came through, he was there to save me.”

“What came through?” Nick asked.

Radha shrugged, “I don’t know. We never found out. Whatever it was got spooked to see us, and it flew back through the rift. Jack was excited to see it go back through, because that’s what Torchwood has always had trouble with. You know, things come through the rift, but it’s difficult to get things to go back through.”

“Huh,” Nick said, thinking hard.

“That’s why Jack offered me a job. My little home-made device was recording better frequencies than the tech they have at the hub even.”

“You must be smart,” Nick smiled at her as he slid into the passenger seat of Radha’s car, a sedan that looked a good fifteen years old with chipped paint, and as she turned it on, became evident the muffler had a hole in it.

Radha smiled shyly. She really was beautiful, Nick thought. “Well, they were only recording frequencies in two dimensions,” she explained. “But the rift has at least three dimensions of frequencies. You know what radio waves look like?”

“Vaguely.”

“OK, well their frequencies are up and down, vertical. The rift was being monitored for frequencies vertically and horizontally. But I was noticing other patterns because I was also monitoring the depth of frequencies.”

“That means nothing to me,” Nick said.

Radha laughed, “All right. I probably wouldn’t understand anatomy.”

Nick laughed too, then fell silent for a few moments as they wound through the streets of Cardiff. “Do you mind if I call my brother?” Nick asked.

“I don’t mind,” she said. “But really, don’t tell him about Torchwood.”

“I won’t,” Nick promised as he pulled his phone out of his pocket. Nick had a strong urge to call Byron, and it would still be morning in Palo City, California.

“Hi,” Byron answered his phone. There were kids giggling in the background. “What’s up?”

“Hey,” Nick said, suddenly unsure exactly why he was calling Byron. “How’re things?”

“Good,” Byron answered. “I don’t know if mom told you, Jeff and I were approved to adopt the twins.”

Nick knew that Byron and Jeff had fostered a set of twins, Asher and Zane, since the boys were two. Their mother was in prison, but had been resistant to give the boys, who were now eight, up for adoption. Byron continued, “Their mom got caught moving drugs in prison. She’s in for life now, so she gave up parental rights. We’re considering it an open adoption though. The boys will still visit her every month.”

“That’s awesome, Byron. You guys must be so happy, the boys too.”

“They really are,” he said. “I didn’t really even know it was bothering them, not being officially adopted, but the way they’re excited. It’s great.”

“Cool,” Nick agred. “Hey listen. I want to send them the Wandering Frog Men.”

Byron laughed a little, “Really? What was up with Dad asking us to make sure you got them anyway?”

Nick leaned his head on the cool glass of the passenger window. “I think dad lost his mind a little at the end. The letter he wrote me talked about how regretful he was about my place in the family. You know, not being one of you triplets, and not being a girl. I don’t know, I think he thought I felt lost.” Nick sighed. “I think the Wandering Frog Men were, like, a symbol of his guilt about how unhappy I was as a kid, because frankly, you, Adam and Jordan were assholes about sharing them with me.”

Byron laughed again, “Well, if you’re sure.”

“I’m sure. I don’t want them. Asher and Zane can play with them. Just make sure they share them with all the kids.”

“I will,” Byron promised. “Is this why you called me?”

Nick bit his lip, “Do you miss him a lot?” A tear leaked out the side of his eye. He didn’t bother to wipe it away, not caring that the very pretty and increasingly flirtatious Radha could see. He was pretty sure he’d be sleeping with her later that evening whether or not she saw him cry.

“Dad?” Byron asked. “Every day. I think about him every day. Especially when the kids reach a milestone, and I think, ‘Dad would have loved to hear about this,’ you know? Like Serena, she got the award for most minutes read during the summer for the whole fourth grade. And mom loved to hear it, but Dad went crazy over that type of news.” Byron paused, “Asher and Zane just loved him, and it really sucks that he’s not here to see them become an official part of the family.” Nick could hear Byron’s voice cracking, “Mallory and I’ve talked a little about this.” Mallory and Byron were the only Pike kids to have children of their own. So far, as Dee liked to point out.

“I wish,” Nick stopped to collect himself and started again, “I wish I could tell him that I’m not concerned anymore about you guys not sharing your toys. There are so many things I wish I could say to him.” Nick realized that it wasn’t Jack or Radha that he wanted to talk to about Torchwood. It was his father. Nick wanted to tell him that he wasn’t crazy, that Torchwood existed and that it was probably bigger than anything John ever could have realized. He wanted to tell him that Jack Harkness had the same pheromones as Dee Pike, which was probably why John had sex with him in the first place. Though, John may have figured that one out on his own.

“You going to be OK?” Byron asked. “Are you still in Wales?”

“Yeah,” Nick answered both questions at once.

“If you’re this upset, maybe you should come home?” Byron offered as advice.

“No, I’m good here,” Nick assured him. “I like it here, and I’ve got that research thing that isn’t finished yet.”

“You sure?” Byron asked.

“Yeah,” Nick said, suddenly himself realizing that, as frightened he was at the discovery he’d made that day, that he wanted to stay. He wanted to learn more about Torchwood. He would go back the next day, and he’d talk to Jack Harkness, and he would beg to become a Torchwood agent.

“Listen,” Nick said. “Thanks for talking to me. I was feeling a little out of sorts, but I feel better now.”

“You sure?” Byron asked again, sounding suspicious. _Damn Byron,_ Nick thought. _Always able to read people even over the phone_.

“Yes,” Nick assured him. “Yes. Listen, I’ll get the Wandering Frog Men in the post this week, all right? And let me know about the boys’ adoption, when it’ll become official and I’ll get them a gift.”

“We’ll be having a big party,” Byron said. “I was hoping the whole Connecticut contingent could make it out to California.”

“Sure,” Nick said, wondering at that moment if he’d be living in Connecticut ever again. Because, at this point, he’d decided he was going to try to make Cardiff, Wales home.


	7. Sunrise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick spends the night with Radha and tries to convince Captain Jack to hire him at Torchwood.

It was early in the morning. Nick was standing at the window in Radha’s apartment, coffee in hand, and staring out at her view. The sunrise this morning was beautiful, all reddish purple slowly turning the sky blue. He wondered if Radha ever woke up early enough to enjoy it, or if she slept through it most mornings.

 

He had been right about them sleeping together the night before. And it had been good, some of the best sex of his life with none of the first-time awkwardness when you normally sleep with someone new. Nick felt drawn to her. This worried Nick, because he wasn’t sure if he really was drawn to her, or if he was drawn to Torchwood, and he was using Radha as a means into Jack Harkness’ secret organization.

 

Radha had read his father’s letter, and she cried over it. That she was so touched meant a great deal to Nick. That she was willing to spend two hours pouring over the letter and every word they’d heard through the vent meant even more to him.

 

The determination he’d felt the night before about moving to Cardiff full-time and becoming a Torchwood agent was waning. By the light of the new morning, what had seemed so heady and exciting the night prior now seemed like a frightful joke. How could a man who looked barely older than Mallory be his great-great grandfather? How could there be aliens running around? How could this secret organization even exist without everyone knowing about it?

 

When Nick had been a teenager and into his early twenties, he’d gone through a phase of reading science fiction almost exclusively. College was stressful for him - moreso than medical school had been really, and science fiction had been the only way he’d been able to destress. Even while he’d been enjoying it, he was always able to point out plot holes.

 

The entirety of the previous day’s events felt like a fiction story with gaping plot holes. Including the fact that time travel doesn’t exist so Jack Harkness’ very existence should be impossible. An organization like Torchwood couldn’t possibly exist in such secrecy. How much did the police know? Gwen had mentioned Mac was a police officer, so there must be some knowledge in the police force. How much of the Royal Family knew of Torchwood’s existence? Only King William? How did an alien impregnate Gwen on her wedding day?

 

Nick was vacillating between a strong desire to stay in Cardiff and get answers, and returning to Stoneybrook immediately and trying to forget his whole time in Cardiff. Maybe he should voluntarily take Retcon? Nick pondered on that thought for a moment, before shaking it out of his head. The idea of doing that seemed even more improbable than Torchwood’s existence. Nick knew that even if he didn’t want to stay and fight aliens, he certainly didn’t want to forget about it. And Nick could keep a secret. I mean, he wasn’t Margo.

 

From his spot in the living room, Nick could hear Radha stirring in the next room. Covers were thrown off and seconds later, Radha appeared wrapping herself in a short blue robe. “Morning,” she said. Nick loved that she came right out of bed, hair mussed up and eyes puffy to say good morning to him. Nick couldn’t stand it when women thought they needed to primp first thing in the morning after he stayed over.

 

“Hi,” Nick said raising his mug to her. “I made coffee.”

 

“Thanks,” she responded gratefully as she made her way into the kitchen and poured herself a mug. “Are you going back today?”

 

“Yes,” he said. “I at least need to have a conversation with Jack. You don’t think he’s going to force Retcon into me, do you?”

 

Radha shrugged, “Jack’s a total mystery to me to tell you the truth. I never quite know what to expect of him.”

 

Nick nodded. He and Radha had spent the previous night talking and discussing whether Nick should stay and try to convince Jack he should be a Torchwood agent, or whether he should forget the whole thing and pack up back to the States. Talking it out had helped Nick feel better at the very least, even if it didn’t help him make a decision.

 

“I don’t want the Retcon,” Nick said. “Above all else, no matter what I decide, I won’t take Retcon.”

 

“Don’t then,” Radha said. “Don’t accept any food or drink, and be on your guard. I don’t know if he has that stuff available by injection.”

 

“Jesus. Injection. I never even thought of that.”

 

Radha wrapped her arm around Nick, “If it helps you at all, I want you to stay.”

 

Nick smiled down at her. He liked Radha. He and Radha had an easy rapport, and had spent the entire previous evening talking seriously, right up until they’d had the mind-blowing sex. He felt a connection to her, and he wasn’t sure if it was pheromones, (something he couldn’t even believe he was considering) that she was connected to Torchwood, or that they genuinely meshed well together. Hearing her say that she wanted him to stay actually did sway him a little bit.

 

“I think I want to. But I can’t do anything without talking to Jack first.”

 

“You want me there with you?”

 

“Mmmm,” Nick considered it. “No, I’d better go in alone. But feel free to listen at the bathroom vent.”

 

Radha smiled, “I was planning on it.”

 

“With Gwen?”

 

“You bet.”

 

“What’s her deal anyway? Isn’t she retired?”

 

“It’s the same reason I think you’ll end up staying,” Radha said. She paused to drink deeply from her coffee, and Nick waited patiently to hear what she had to say, “Torchwood is addictive. Once you know about it you can’t get it out of your head. Gwen is addicted to Torchwood, and she’s definitely addicted to her friendship with Jack. I don’t even know why Rhys puts up with it.”

 

“Are she and Jack….?” Nick drifted off.

 

“No. I don’t think so at least. I thought Jack was gay at first, but now I think he’s bisexual. But I still don’t think he and Gwen are anything like that. Jack respects her more than he respects anyone, at least as far as I’ve seen.”

 

“Have you and Jack?”

 

“No,” Radha smiled.

 

“He’s really handsome,” Nick said. “I’m not even gay and I can see that.”

 

“So handsome,” Radha agreed. “But I have, no desire to mix work with pleasure. Well, I had no desire anyway.” She smirked.

 

Nick smiled at her. He got what she was saying.

 

“C’mon,” she tilted her head toward the bedroom, “Let’s shower before we go back to the hub.”

 

___________

 

Radha drove them back to the hub, and they went through the pathetic visitors center and down the lift.

 

Nick followed her to the center bay which was covered in computers and other tech gadgetry. She turned on the biggest computer, and they all lit to life. “You can’t look,” she ordered.

 

“I don’t even know what any of this means,” he pointed out.

 

She gave him a Look, indicating that he needed to pay attention to something else. He took the hint and climbed the stairs toward Jack’s office.

 

The door swung open right as he reached the top of the stairs. “Nick. You came back,” Jack Harkness said, his voice sounding simultaneously annoyed but unsurprised.

 

“Morning, Jack.” Nick said, keeping his voice chipper.

 

Jack sighed, and massaged his temples briefly. “Come on in,” said said sounding resigned and motioning Nick into the office.

 

Nick entered the office and Jack followed, closing the door behind him. From out the window, he saw Radha heading toward the bathroom, and smiled a little inside.

 

“You shouldn’t have come back,” Jack began.

 

“Really?” Nick asked. “You think I could walk away?”

 

Jack sat at the chair behind his desk and leaned forward, clasping his hands in front of them atop the desk. Nick looked at him and realized that after only one night, Jack seemed more tired, his eyes more full of depression than he’d had the day prior. His eyes looked about a hundred years older than his face. “I’ve been thinking about it,” Jack said. “We have two options.”

 

“All right,” Nick said slowly.

 

“The first option is that you go back to the States, and you never ever talk about your time in Cardiff. You don’t talk about Torchwood, and when you’re on your deathbed you don’t write a letter to your son about it. You choose this option and you must know that Torchwood will track you until your dying day and will get Retcon into anyone you talk to about us.” Jack paused before continuing, “The second option is that you voluntarily take the retcon if you think you won’t be able to keep quiet about it. You go back to the States and you get back with your girlfriend and you keep working at Stoneybrook General Hospital, and you maybe have kids someday and you are happy and alive and safe and you won’t know any different. And Torchwood will never bother you again.”

 

Jack looked at Nick expectantly. Nick swallowed, “I choose option three.”

 

“There is no option three,” Jack insisted.

 

“Sure there is,” Nick argued. “Option three is you let me in.” Jack shook his head and Nick pressed on, “I want in Torchwood. I want to be here.”

 

“You don’t know what you’re asking for,” Jack said.

 

“Maybe not, but does anyone? Did Gwen know? Radha? Mac? Has anyone who’s ever worked for Torchwood really understood it until they were in the thick of it?”

 

“Look,” Jack said. Nick could tell he was becoming impatient. “I know you’ve lost your dad recently and that you have all these….emotions about it. And I also know you slept with Radha last night-”

 

Nick cut him off, “How could you possibly know that?”

 

“You’re wearing the same clothes you did yesterday, your hair is wet and you came in with her.”

 

“Good catch, Sherlock,” Nick said. He was becoming aggravated. “But that doesn’t have anything to do with you not letting me become a part of Torchwood.”

 

“You have a mother and seven siblings,” Jack persisted. “Do you really think you can go the rest of your life living in a different country? Doing a job you aren’t allowed to tell them about? How difficult was it to not tell Byron the truth last night?”

 

Nick was startled into pausing momentarily. “How do you know I called Byron last night?”

 

“We’re watching you,” Jack said. “As long as you know about Torchwood, you’re going to be monitored. If it had sounded like you were going to tell Byron about us, the call would have been disconnected.”

 

“You can’t-”

 

Jack cut him off, “Oh yes I can. I can and I will. If you want to go back to Stoneybrook without taking Retcon, the rest of your life will be us monitoring you.”

 

“I’m not going back to Stoneybrook,” Nick insisted. “I can’t for another four months anyway. I took a six month research job and I intend to see it through.”

 

Jack gave him a Look, clearly indicating he didn’t believe a word of Nick’s excuse. “I’m sure you could find a way to get out of a job that you work at so little it gave you time to investigate Torchwood.”

 

“I’m not leaving,” Nick persisted.

 

Jack sighed and leaned back in his chair and stared at the ceiling. “You don’t know what you’re saying.” He lowered his head and looked Nick straight in the eye. “You have no idea what it’s like, leaving all that family behind.”

 

“Well,” Nick said. “I’ll have you, won’t I?”

 

“What?” Jack asked.

 

Nick shrugged, “You told me yesterday that we’re related. So, I’ll have you. You’re my family, right? What are we, cousins?” He carefully avoided saying great-great-Grandfather. He didn’t need Jack knowing he’d listened to his conversation.

 

Immediately, Nick knew he struck a nerve and Jack’s resolve was waning. So he pressed on, “It sounds like you don’t have family around here. But here I am,” Nick gestured to himself. “Why are you turning away an opportunity to have a cousin around?”

 

Jack was silent for several moments, and Nick decided to stop speaking. He watched as Jack seemed to be having a painful internal struggle. Jack scratched at his forehead and closed his eyes. Finally he muttered, “I can’t believe I’m about to do this.”

 

“Do what?” Nick asked eagerly.

 

Jack,3bb looking defeated, sighed, and pushed himself back from his desk. “Follow me.” He sounded resigned.

 

Nick followed Jack out of the office, glancing and shrugging at Radha who’d just come out of the bathroom. Radha gave him a quick thumbs up.

 

They ended up in a room that Nick immediately recognized as a morgue. The walls were lined with beds in drawers. Jack went to one, typed a code into the number pad and pulled it out. On the bed was the body of a man in a hospital gown. “This guy came in a couple nights ago,” Jack began. He pulled the gown up, revealing a dark, perfectly round mark on the man’s left upper abdomen. “Every ten years, we get a body - usually a homeless person, who has this mark on their abdomen. This is the fourth guy. I want you to do two things. First, do an autopsy on this guy, then I want you to go down to the archives and read the reports on the other three cases just like this. Tell me what you find.”

 

Nick knew better than to tell Jack that he wasn’t a pathologist. He’d never done a complete autopsy by himself in his life, though he’d done rounds as an intern and a resident. He’d very nearly gone in to pathology, but in the end decided something with more patient face-time. But doing an autopsy looking for something unusual? He wasn’t sure this was up his alley. Still, he put on a brave face and said to Jack, “Well show me the archives then.”

 

Jack gave Nick a sort of cringe-smile, and said, “Follow me.” Nick followed him down, and down, and down some more until they were well into the depths of the ground. Jack rapped on a door, “These are the archives,” he said. Nick looked around. It was dank and damp down here. The lighting was by electrical lanterns, the orange type that you’d normally see on construction sites. The walls were stone.

 

Jack swung the door open, “It’s disorganized,” he admitted.

 

Jack wasn’t kidding. Nick couldn’t help but stare, mouth agape at the large, cavernous room. The walls were lined with file cabinets. Too many for Nick to even count. The center of the room was a jumble of tables with confusing pieces of tech, files, paperwork, boxes, some random blinking lights, a jar with a hand floating in it, and various other bits of Nick didn’t even know what. “Where are the autopsies?” he asked.

 

Jack shrugged, “One of the file cabinets. Our doctors always know, but we don’t have a doctor on staff at the moment.”

 

“Huh,” Nick said, realizing at that moment that finding three autopsy reports in this mess would probably actually be more difficult than performing an autopsy on a man who’d died mysteriously.

 

“I’ll leave you to it,” Jack said, slapping Nick on the shoulder. “Your success determines whether I let you stay. You have ten hours.” Jack turned to leave, but when he got to the door, looked back at Nick. “And I’m not sending Radha down to help you.”

 

The door slammed loudly behind him.

 

Nick stood still for a few moments, taking the room in. He walked over to the tables and glanced at the detritus that lay before him. He recognized nothing, and wondered how much of it was alien. He reached over and lifted what looked to be an ordinary rock. The first thing he noticed was that the rock was much heavier than it looked like it should be. The next thing he noticed was that the rock began glowing yellow where his fingers had been. He dropped it quickly and watched for the next minute as the yellow faded back to the slate-grey color.

 

No more touching strange objects, he decided. Anyway, he was here to do something; he needed to find three autopsy reports in this mass of mess. He figured they were most likely to be in the filing cabinets, so he started at the first cabinet by the door.

 

The first filing cabinet said Jack Harkness -Personal. Nick tried the drawers and found them locked. The very next cabinet said Ianto Jones - Personal. Those drawers were unlocked. The top drawer had Ianto’s personnel file. Nick flipped through it, and saw a picture of a guy wearing a smart suit. He had brown hair and just a quirk of a smile on apple-cheekedagw his face. Nick knew there wouldn’t be autopsy reports in this cabinet, but continued to peek curiously. There were notes and photos about a woman in a frightening looking metal suit. Lisa was her name. Nick didn’t read thoroughly, but understood enough. Ianto had been trying to keep her alive and figure out a way to help her live without the metal suit.

 

The second drawer down had only one large brown envelope. Nick took it out and peeked through the photos. God. They were all provocative nude photos of Jack Harkness. Nick shoved the photos back into the envelope and slammed the drawer shut. Between the mysterious rock and Jack Harkness’s naked body, Nick had quickly learned to not let his curiosity get the best of him.

 

Nick walked from filing cabinet to filing cabinet. They all had labels on them in the handwriting that Nick recognized from Ianto Jones’ notes about Lisa. Despite the mess in the center of the room, it seemed that the filing cabinets were, at least, somewhat organized.

 

Sure enough, after a few minutes of browsing, Nick came to a filing cabinet marked Medical - Alien. A few cabinets later one was marked Medical - Human. He opened the top drawer and saw that the very first divider was marked Autopsies - Human. Thank god for small favors, it hadn’t been that difficult.

 

The problem was that the autopsies were in alphabetical order by subjects last name, and there were plenty called John Doe or Jane Doe. Another problem? These autopsy reports dated back about 150 years. Nick sighed. He had to think about this logically. He could immediately dismiss the oldest reports, those yellow with age and hand-written. Jack had said the bodies were found every ten years. So his best bet was to look for reports for ten years ago (2026), ten years before that (2016), and ten before that (2006).

 

Once he’d made that decision, searching became much easier. Within ninety minutes, he held in his hands, the autopsy report for Kenneth Flynt, who died in 2026, Delyth Smith who died in 2016, and Maired O’Connor who died in 2006. All were found with dark black circular marks on their bodies.

 

He took the files out of the archives and followed the long winding halls and staircases back up to the main part of the Hub. He was glad to be out of there. The depths of Torchwood were oppressive and creepy.

 

Finally he made it back to the morgue. Jack Harkness and Radha were there waiting for him. Jack’s eyebrows were raised, “That was faster than I expected.” He appeared loathe to admit it.

 

Nick gave a small smile, “Ianto Jones did a fair job of filing. The paperwork, at least.”

 

Nick carefully watched Jack’s face when he mentioned Ianto. Although Jack did a good job keeping his face expressionless, Nick thought he saw a hitch in the breath and the ghost of a frown cross his face. “Well, here’s your guy,” Jack said pulling the morgue bed out again. “We don’t know his name yet. Radha’s going to run a DNA test on him and we’ll get a match shortly.”

 

“All right,” Nick said.

 

Radha grabbed the swab she’d taken earlier, gave Nick a small smile and scurried out of the morgue. Jack stayed behind. “Nick,” he said. Then he fell silent.

 

Nick waited. He didn’t even know what was the appropriate thing to say in this situation. His parents taught him manners, but there was no etiquette lesson for what you say right before an autopsy of a stranger and to your great-great Grandfather who was a time-traveler and appeared to be only ten years older than you and was the head of an alien-hunting organization that you were currently fighting with him over whether or not you could join. Also, that great-great Grandfather fucked your dad, who’s now dead, once. It was an absurd situation.

 

Jack never finished his thought, and instead turned and left. Nick was even more confused about what was going on in Jack’s head. The argumentative Jack, the one who was staunchly refusing to have him join Torchwood was one thing. But this Jack? The one who only now seemed aware of his relationship to Nick? Nick didn’t know what to think.

 

But, he had other things to do besides think about Jack Harkness’s feelings. He had an autopsy to perform, and three reports to read. Nick flipped through the three reports. He was surprised that they were written in the same format that Stoneybrook General used. Something else he noted is that each autopsy was performed by a different doctor. So Jack’s concern about people not lasting long at Torchwood was noted.

 

The turnover in doctors made for some shody work. Nick could see within minutes that what connected all three, in addition to the mark on the body, was that they were all missing a spleen. Only the 2006 report, written by Owen Harper, noted the probable cause of death as splenic rupture.

 

Well, he knew what to look out for. Nick tossed the reports onto the counter, searched through the cabinets for a surgical gown, gloves, and tools. He found everything and began the autopsy.

 

He used his phone to record his notes. Even though he he was no expert in performing autopsies, he decided to go in the same order that the other reports had been in. External description and examination before cutting in to the body for the internal exam.

 

Just as Nick expected, this John Doe was missing his spleen, but….something wasn’t right. Nick did a cursory search of the body cavity, but decided he wanted Jack to see this before he went any further.

 

He removed his gloves and gown and left the morgue. He climbed the stairs to the main part of the hub and looked around. He couldn’t see anyone there. Even Radha wasn’t at her position in front of the computers. Nick continued to look. At the top of the stairs, he saw a brief movement in the window of Jack’s office.

 

When he got toward the office, he heard muffled voices. The door was slightly ajar, so Nick knocked as he opened it. “Oh!” he said. “Sorry!”

 

He turned and pulled the door shut behind him. He’d walked in on Jack and Mac, half-naked and kissing. “Shit,” he heard one of them say through the door.

 

“Just a sec!” Jack called out. A few moments later, he opened the door. Jack Harkness’s hair was disheveled and his face had a sheen of perspiration. Nick couldn’t help but notice his lips, which were red and plump. “Hi!” he said. “Need me?”

 

Nick glanced behind Jack and noticed Mac looking both terrified and embarrassed. “Uh, yeah,” he answered. “I wanted to show you something. In the body.”

 

“Sure,” Jack answered, closing the door behind him.

 

“Sorry,” Nick said again, as they walked back toward the morgue. “I didn’t know-”

 

Jack cut him off, “It’s fine. Not the first time it’s happened.” Nick remembered what Radha said about Jack sleeping with most of his employees.

 

They got back to the morgue and Nick handed Jack the prior autopsy reports. “You’ve had some shit physicians here.”

 

“I know,” Jack nodded. “It’s not as easy to find good people as you’d think.”

 

Nick couldn’t tell if that was sarcasm, because he was pretty sure finding a good doctor to work on alien autopsies for  top-secret organization actually wasn’t  simple. He pushed further, “All four of the bodies have had their spleens missing. Only one of the doctors, Owen Harper back in 2006, managed to realize splenic rupture was the cause of death. But they all missed out on something important.”

 

“What’s that?” Jack asked.

 

Nick pulled on a pair of surgical gloves and went over to the body. “See this?” he pointed something.

 

“Yeah?” Jack asked.

 

“That’s the splenic artery. See how the end is ragged?”

 

“Yeah?”

 

“His spleen wasn’t surgically removed. He had a Grade-V rupture of the spleen, and it happened right here at the artery.”

 

“OK…?” Jack asked. Sounding confused. “So his spleen ruptured? And that’s what killed him?”

 

“Technically I don’t know if the spleen ruptured,” Nick answered slowly. “Because there is no spleen in the body.”

 

“What?”

 

Nick shrugged. “His spleen isn’t there. But it looks like it’s been, I don’t know, yanked out of him. She all the free blood in the cavity? That’s because he bled out from this artery. But there is no spleen. Not even pieces of spleen anywhere in his entire body.”

 

There was a pause. “So what you’re saying,” Jack said slowly, “Is that he died, not from a splenic rupture, but from having his spleen forcibly removed from his body.”

 

“Yes,” Nick nodded. “But there was no point of entry into his body. There’s the mark on his abdomen, which is where the spleen is. But his skin is whole. There was no cut into the body to get to the spleen.”

 

Jack looked thoughtful. Nick was impressed, as how quickly Jack could go from looking thoroughly sexed to thoroughly professional. He’d had, Nick guessed, a lot of practice.

 

“Remind me what the spleen does.” Jack said.

 

“It’s basically a blood filter,” Nick answered. “It’s function is for our immune system. Boosting red-blood cells, holding lymphocytes, and reserving blood for shock.”

 

“Immune system,” Jack murmured, thinking hard. “Does the spleen have healing properties?”

 

Nick nodded. “In some mammals anyway. There are monocytes that can travel to tissues and act as macrophages for pathogens, or as dendratic cells…” Jack looked lost at the terminology. Nick assumed that Jack being the urbane, time-traveling, death-defying man that he is, would understand. He started over. “Yes.There are reserves in the spleen that can heal some injured tissues.”

 

“I think I might know who did this,” Jack sounded surprised. He turned and walked out the morgue. Nick stood there dumbly, looking at the spot Jack had just vacated.

 

Two seconds later Jack came back in, “You coming?”

 

“I...yeah.” Nick nodded. “Yes. I’m coming.”

 

As they walked quickly through the hub, Nick shot Radha a smile eyebrows raised. She grinned back and gave him a quick thumbs-up. He felt a small spring in his step as he followed Jack into the lift, and up to the cool Cardiff afternoon.

  
  



End file.
